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F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition pros and cons

Vendor: F5
4.4 out of 5

Pros & Cons summary

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Prominent pros & cons

PROS

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition significantly improves user experience, performance, and security.
F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition reduces costs, with significant savings compared to traditional hardware setups.
Organizations benefit from streamlined operations and improved uptime with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.
Protection and compliance are enhanced with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's advanced features like web application firewall and SSL offloading.
F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition reduces security incidents and service interruptions while offering seamless connectivity.

CONS

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition needs improvement in logging and microservices support, particularly in Docker and Kubernetes environments.
The pricing and setup costs are high, with limited licensing options like the lack of 10 gig licensing.
Failover functionality is unreliable, with occasional failures during testing.
Resource utilization is high, especially concerning CPU, RAM, and storage, when handling multiple modules or SSL orchestration.
Customer support experiences are often poor, with delays and inadequate assistance.
 

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition Pros review quotes

reviewer2800392 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Architect at a pharma/biotech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Jan 31, 2026
Compared to our physical environment, with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition we have saved approximately one hundred thousand dollars, reduced our team from five people to two, and achieved an overall cost reduction of twenty-five to thirty percent, with some areas reaching forty percent.
reviewer2802939 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Engineer at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees
Feb 15, 2026
Before F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we were dealing with recurring service interruptions, sometimes multiple incidents in a month or a week, and after moving to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, those dropped to very rare occurrences, with outages happening once in a blue moon.
reviewer2800377 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr network engineer at a transportation company with 10,001+ employees
Jan 30, 2026
F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has positively impacted my organization at the State of Oregon by streamlining operations, delivering significant time savings, reducing errors, and giving me a clearer overview of which features each customer has, which minimizes mistakes during operations and enhances our overall efficiency.
Learn what your peers think about F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: August 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Srinivasan Arumugam - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Engineer at a healthcare company with 11-50 employees
Mar 5, 2026
Since we implemented F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we have experienced better application performance and lower costs compared to hardware appliances, along with flexibility in deploying F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition across multiple hybrid clouds.
Hammad Halim - PeerSpot reviewer
IT consultant at Beginning Solutions IT
Jan 16, 2026
I would highly recommend F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition to everyone because we have had a phenomenal experience using this device.
reviewer2800341 - PeerSpot reviewer
Cybersecurity Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Jan 30, 2026
Organizations, if you are using or if you want an enterprise-level solution, you definitely have to go with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.
reviewer1469877 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Consutant at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Feb 1, 2026
Overall, the application stability and performance are all at par.
reviewer2869257 - PeerSpot reviewer
Engineer at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Jul 7, 2026
Others should use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition; F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is a leading marketplace solution with a good opportunity to improve, and the company is improving day by day and showing updates and fixing patches to keep devices and maintain customer security appliances in a positive state in the environment.
Prity Lata - PeerSpot reviewer
Analyst at Accenture
Mar 3, 2026
F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has positively impacted my organization by simplifying management, as we previously had to manage hardware boxes, and now with the virtual edition it is easy to use and reliable, and we have been working with it for the last three to four years without a single issue reported, making it a very reliable and stable product.
JagdishLal - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at HCLSoftware
Feb 7, 2026
I would advise others considering F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition that it is the best instrument for load balancing.
 

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition Cons review quotes

reviewer2800392 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Architect at a pharma/biotech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Jan 31, 2026
The failover capability is also not as good as it should be. We have tested the failover functionality, and sometimes we have observed that failover fails.
reviewer2802939 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Engineer at a government with 1,001-5,000 employees
Feb 15, 2026
However, for new engineers, it can take some time to fully understand and use all the features efficiently, especially around advanced traffic policies and customization.
reviewer2800377 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr network engineer at a transportation company with 10,001+ employees
Jan 30, 2026
In terms of improvements for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, I encountered issues with load management when multiple modules such as AFM, APM, LTM, and GTM are handled together.
Learn what your peers think about F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: August 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Srinivasan Arumugam - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Security Engineer at a healthcare company with 11-50 employees
Mar 5, 2026
The improvement points I can suggest are that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition tends to be highly resource-intensive, as we often encounter issues with high CPU, RAM, and storage utilization, particularly with ASM and LTM modules.
Hammad Halim - PeerSpot reviewer
IT consultant at Beginning Solutions IT
Jan 16, 2026
I believe F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition could be improved in the area of pricing. It is a somewhat expensive solution, and the price needs to be improved based on what our customers have told us.
reviewer2800341 - PeerSpot reviewer
Cybersecurity Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Jan 30, 2026
As per my understanding, there is a need to improve support. Sometimes it is very critical to get support for that.
reviewer1469877 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Consutant at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Feb 1, 2026
I feel that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition could be improved because overall, it is a pretty good product, but the licensing is rather costly.
reviewer2869257 - PeerSpot reviewer
Engineer at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Jul 7, 2026
F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has limited resources for SSL Orchestrator and other technologies.
Prity Lata - PeerSpot reviewer
Analyst at Accenture
Mar 3, 2026
My experience with pricing and setup costs for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition was mixed, as they do not have an option for 10 gig licensing, which was costly for us.
JagdishLal - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at HCLSoftware
Feb 7, 2026
The customer support for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has been satisfactory. While getting a trial license, I communicated with the customer support team, and they responded in a timely manner. However, there was a wait time of two or three days, which could be improved.